The mediating effect of emotion regulation strategy between inappropriate parenting styles and self-injury in medical students

Objective To explore the relationships between inappropriate parenting styles, emotional regulation strategies and self-injury. Methods A total of 1 096 medical students anonymously completed adolescents self-harm scale, emotion regulation scale (ERS) and the rejection and over-protection subscales of parental bonding instrument (PBI). Results The scores of paternal rejection, maternal rejection, paternal over-protection, maternal over-protection, cognitive reappraisal, expression suppression and self-injury were (4.3±3.3), (3.9±3.0), (5.7±3.3), (6.1±3.5), (36.1±6.7), (25.7±7.4) and (1.0±2.9), respectively.The scores of self-injury were positively correlated with the scores of paternal rejection, maternal rejection, paternal over-protection, maternal over-protection and expression suppression(r=0.08-0.20, P<0.01), meanwhile negatively correlated with the scores of cognitive reappraisal(r=-0.10, P<0.01). Cognitive reappraisal mediated the relationship between parental rejection and self-injury, which accounted for 9.3%.Expression suppression mediated the relationship between parental rejection, parental over-protection and self-injury, which accounted for 14.5% and 17.9%, respectively. Conclusion The emotion regulation strategy act as a mediator between the inappropriate parental styles and self-injury in medical students.In addition, different emotion regulation strategies (cognitive reappraisal and expression suppression) play different roles in such relationship. Key words: Inappropriate parenting style; Emotional regulation strategies; Self-injury; Medical students